Alan White

I saw that too Jeremy and thought, be good for Solar, shall I and you got to your holster and drew first, good on you. Those LE are a nice small well made eyepiece. Perfect size for Binoviewer I should think.

An interesting one that, never heard of her before, one for my to do list. Thank you Stephan. As to Dave and John, I see where you are both coming from. Mrs f15's reaction is much as Mrs W's would be.

@Highburymark, thank you, all very encouraging and most helpful advice. I did wonder if I had the luck to be let loose with a top end instrument. Of course my interest has been ignited, knowing that its not the best in Ha at present, so 🤞for some more activity very soon. I love White Light observing, so the next obvious step is Ha, dedicated scope or perhaps a Quark? The one thing on the SolarSccope was its instant, not waiting for things to warm up or tune, just focus, very simple, very intuative and perhaps thats part of the extra cost to get that.

NIce to see you back and running Jake, had wondered where you had been. Something special about returning after a break.

Hello All, I have to share the joy from today so far. My club owns a Solarscope SV-50, which I am lucky enough to have on loan at present. So its been with me a week and first good sky in daylight today, so set up and took a peak. It was amazing, so much so that I am still looking for my socks, where they got blown off. So is it first exposure enthusiasm or is today just very active in Ha and Prominances? if I have my terminology correct. I have sent several excited messages to astro friends on this already, I am truly shocked at what I can see. Somehow I poresuume the SV-50 is a great and easy to use telescope, it feels very well made indeed, I have no idea how much one would cost as cannot find out online. Rather than a broken hour of White Light, work keeps intruding, I have spent it all in Ha and keep wanting to go back out. Somehow I can see an expensive purchase come up and my Solar Observing, which is already a passion, will grown again. Best buy a lottery ticket or two me thinks. Had to share, I know those who observe Solar will get the new boy on the block enthusiasm.

Somewhere we have always wanted to visit, but never made it to so far. Sounds great, the sky sounds most tempting.

Having time on our hands due to illness or lots of cloud never ends well for our finances Nigella, Hope you get well soon.

A very interesting question you raise John, It also again demonstrates that a 4" refractor can provide plenty to keep us amused with as Visual Observers. Interesting on folks thoughts on why you can decern the differences based on the scope resolution, but us Refractor lovers all know they come with a sprinkle of magic and that's what makes the differnce. So my official reply is 'It's down to Magic Refractor Dust, coming into play'

It was the barrel that made me do it.

It was from fleabay

But the AZ100 will be growing tracking sometime, we know it's in development after all. Just look here and on Cloudy Nights.

I think you are after something that does not exitst to be honest, Manual and Driven? will watch this thread with interest though.

Somehow, I wrongly presumed all scope makers rather than general mass producers provided test certification. Heck at that level of investment, I would feel I need a but more than trust in a QA process. Nice click bait by the way....

Postie visited today with a recent purchase, have wanted to try one of these for ages. He also brought a few cards as well, Birthday today as well, so a present for myself.

That's a first, 'cuddle my scope' selfies..... ooo now we can have another thread......anyone

I think the mount shown has tension controls, but does not lock to have an altitude lock for notable balance changes. A side note, Wow a 40 XW, bet that’s nice. An Alt Az without altitude lock needs the altitude tension locked when making notable changes of eyepiece, such as a 30APM UFF down to a 3-6 Zoom, but it can be done fairly easily with practice, however a separate Altitude lock makes things easier and far nicer. I don’t understand when someone makes an alt Az without an altitude lock to be honest.

I think lack of slow motion is a benefit, not a loss in any way. In most of my Astronomy time, I have never had a slow motion and when I did, found it more faff than benefit. How many dob owners have slow motion? How many use higher power, a lot and they / we get on just fine. We should be thankful for more quality mounts, Astronomy is very healthy at present, more decent kit makes for folks staying in the hobby. Nothing faster than bad kit to send folks scurrying away to something else.

Looks great Garry, I am sure it will do you well, pleased that it’s what you bought as I had the very mount in mind when I saw you selling for a mount upgrade.

So would I, but I hazard a guess that the 130 will get more use.

A question Steve, @Second Time Around. Do you place your eyepieces upright? And do you recap everyone so as to leave no lenses open? I ask as I tried camera bags for Eyepieces, but found as I moved through them at night, I didnt recap as I would reuse again and felt the glass was vulnerable to me stupidly putting a return into the wrong compartment in the dark, with the resulting clank of metal onto glass. I must say this was not a reality thankfully, but hainted me enough to change storage option. PS Hope the recovery goes well and that you are not suffering too badly.

Wot Stu says, but add Very to the front 👍

A real shame you have to hide it under a dark cloth though Stu 😉🤣 What make is that, the top end design looks different to those I have seen before?

It’s amazing what you can get delivered these days, who was the supplier 😉

Definate on the 45 degrees? Vixen obviously misbadged them 😉 I honestly think its a bad cut and paste on the details on websites.

Vlad, it look like some cloth is inside the Eyepiece to me.